The Storm and the Fury
by ariel2me
Summary: A collection of drabbles written for Stannis Month on Tumblr.
1. Chapter 1

**Stannis Baratheon & Shireen Baratheon**

They will tell you that your father lied to steal a throne, to plunder a realm.

I was never that grasping, that greedy. I never wished for a single drop more than what was rightfully mine.

They will tell you that your father was ensorcelled by a sorceress; bewitched, misled, misdirected, led astray by the red woman.

I was never that spineless, that weak-willed. I was never anyone's puppet. I am my own man. I made my own choices. They may have been the wrong ones, at times, with dreadful consequences, but I _chose_. I have always chosen. As someday my daughterwill have to choose. When you wear the crown, on your own head be it, the weight of all your decisions, all your mistakes, all your blunders. If we deserve the praise and the admiration for the good, then justice dictates that we deserve the blame and the reproach for the bad as well.

They may even mean well, some of them, when they tell you how I was ridden like a horse by the Lady Melisandre, how I was not culpable, how I did not know any better, how it was all _her_ fault, _her_ doing. You will not believe in that lie, because you are my daughter, and you must know that a lie is a lie and must be taken out, even if it is meant to defend, to justify, even to comfort. Even when it comes out of undiminished loyalty.

Even when it comes out of love.

There is no such thing as a harmless lie.

You are the Princess Shireen of House Baratheon, you are my daughter, and you do not belong with the ranks of self-deceivers.

But I fear that you will believe what you wish to believe, about the distant father who had been like a ship passing through the dark night, about the stranger waiting to be visited by the Stranger.

And how could I blame you, when I have never taught you to know your own father?

You will have your mother still, the mother who loves you and will protect you at the cost of her own life. She resents a great many things, your mother; we have that in common, she and I. But she does not resent her daughter and she does not hate her only child, despite the lies spread by a few unscrupulous fools. You know the truth of it far better than anyone; you who have known the tenderness she had never shown elsewhere.

You will have your mother still, if not your father; and for that, I could have almost forgiven the gods who were so monstrous as to drown both my mother and my father while their young sons stood watching, praying for mercy and justice that never came.

 _Forgiven, but not forgotten._

 **AO3 Mirror**

gotfic stannismonth Stannis Baratheon Shireen Baratheon Selyse Baratheon


	2. Chapter 2

**Stannis + ancestors (Lyonel Baratheon, Ormund Baratheon)**

The Laughing Storm had caught Robert's imagination from the moment he saw a likeness of his great-grandsire in one of Maester Cressen's history books. In the picture, Lyonel Baratheon was sitting proudly astride his horse, his head tilted back, his wind-tossed jet black hair falling over one eye, and he was depicted laughing uproariously at an unseen opponent.

"He must have been jousting at some great and grand tourney. Look how _big_ his lance is!" Robert said, voice full of wonder and amazement.

"If it was truly a joust, then he would have been wearing his helm and we would not be able to see his hair at all," Stannis pointed out, for the Laughing Storm was also famous for the gleaming rack of iron antlers atop his helm.

Robert groaned. "It's a picture! Not boring history lesson."

Stannis had been drawn more to the Baratheon grandsire he never met, the man who toiled in the perpetual shadow of his famous (some might say _infamous_ ) and larger-than-life father, the man Stannis' own father had actually known. And loved. And deeply mourned still, years after Ormund Baratheon's death in his son's arms.

At times it seemed as if Steffon was struck anew at his father's absence with each recall of his name. Stannis had no true notion of this, did not comprehend until it was _far_ too late how daily present an absence could feel, how _palpable_ the impossible yearning for the dead could be. (Grief was not a void; it was a hungry, angry beast demanding to be fed, always clamoring for its due. He wished his father had taught him that.)

But then there were the fond and loving memories too; stories told, untold and retold by Steffon Baratheon about his lord father, scenes and episodes from a life gone by, a life never witnessed by Lord Ormund's grandsons.

"If there was ever a likeness of my father in the history books, it should show him surrounded by quills and parchments, noting down the exact grain figures in the storehouses and granaries, and assessing the strength of our garrison down to the last man and the last horse."

"But was he not a brave, strong warrior in his own right, like his lord father had been?" Robert asked, sounding less than enamored with his grandsire.

"He marched alongside his father when Lord Lyonel declared against the Targaryens, and later he led King Jaehaerys' army against the pretenders calling themselves the Ninepenny Kings, but my father did not relish fighting and killing for its own sake. He saw it as his duty, a thing that must be done to protect his land and his people, but otherwise, something to be avoided."

It was hard choosing for Ormund Baratheon, between his father and his king, the king he had been sent to squire for at a young age, back when Lord Lyonel and King Aegon had been fast friends, before the broken betrothal and the shattered trust. Like his father, Ormund had been furious at the shameful treatment of his sister meted out by Prince Duncan. But unlike his father, Ormund Baratheon thought that the matter had been resolved with Prince Duncan renouncing his claim to the throne. Duncan Targaryen was the guilty party, he paid for it with his crown, and that was sufficient punishment in Ormund's eyes. Lyonel Baratheon thought otherwise.

"He chose blood, in the end. My father chose his lord father over his loyalty to his king, but only after all his efforts to convince his father to reconsider his decision had proved futile. After he became Lord of Storm's End, however, my father was never anything other than a leal servant to King Aegon and King Jaehaerys. He thought the Baratheons were suspect, in the eyes of many, because of his lord father's failed rebellion. He thought that he had to be the one to prove House Baratheon's loyalty to the Iron Throne. He saw that as his duty."

Ormund Baratheon had died under the Targaryen banner leading King Jaehaerys' army in the Stepstones, twenty one years after his father had raised his own banner against the Targaryens. Surely even the Targaryens would see that as sufficient proof of House Baratheon's loyalty, Stannis thought. "You never know. There is no telling with some people," Steffon Baratheon told his son, when he explained why he did not dare refuse King Aerys' summon recalling him to court and naming him to the small council.

 **AO3 Mirror**


	3. Chapter 3

**Stannis + history (Siege of Storm's End), Stannis + ancestor (Argella Durrandon)**

Maester Cressen found him at the parapet, staring out to Shipbreaker Bay at a storm of ships flying the burgundy banners.

"Would that your gods are useful enough to send another storm to destroy the Redwyne fleet, Maester."

Cressen looked shocked, but his voice was gentle. "It is not a thing to be prayed for, my lord. Of any god."

"What is not to be prayed for? To pray for the death of our enemies? Shall we pray only for the death of our loved ones?"

The maester's hand hovered over Stannis' shoulder. Once, Cressen would not have hesitated to place his hand there, even to squeeze the flesh in a gesture of comfort, of affection, of commiseration. But this was no longer a boy standing beside him, and he was no longer certain how welcomed the gesture would be to this young man.

"Have no fear, Maester. I have no intention of praying to the Seven for anything, even for the death of our enemies."

Standing on this same parapet, they had prayed together for Lord Steffon and his lady wife, and for the other unfortunate souls aboard Windproud. The storm did not let up, though. And the ship still sank.

"Has there been another raven?"

"No, my lord."

The last news they had of Robert told of his march to the Trident. Prince Rhaegar had returned from whatever bolthole he had been hiding in, to lead an army of more than forty thousand men to meet Robert's force, it was claimed.

If Robert should fall in battle …

 _Bend the knee, my lord. Bend the knee and open the gates. And we may all live yet._

 _Never. I made a promise to my brother. They will have to come and take the castle._

 _You may take my castle, but you will win only bones, blood and ashes,_ the last storm queen had declared.

Would his men betray him, like Argella Durrandon's men had betrayed her?

Ser Gawen had tried. Gawen Wylde and three of his knights, attempting to sneak out the back gate in the dark of night to surrender to Randyll Tarly. Stannis had caught them himself. Storm's End's master-at-arms, the man who had put the first wooden sword in Stannis' hand when he was all of five, the knight who had told Stannis that a man should wear his scars with pride when Stannis' first real sword grazed his own cheek and drew blood.

To be betrayed by those you _trusted_ , by those you had foolishly believed were not capable of betrayal …

No, they were not truly _his_ men, they were Robert's men, given to his sacred keeping and made his solemn duty, as Storm's End was, in Robert's absence.

"If your brother is dead –" Cressen began.

"Not _you_ too, Maester!" Stannis snapped. "I will not open the gates for our enemies to enter Storm's End unopposed. I will not! That is the end of it."

"You are your brother's heir. If he is dead, then –"

"Then they will make Eddard Stark king. Or Jon Arryn."

"Neither has a claim to the throne."

Neither did Robert, strictly speaking. His Targaryen blood came through the female line. "Aerys is mad. He has broken all covenants with his lords after his brutal slaying of Rickard Stark and Brandon Stark." That had been Jon Arryn's argument, that Aerys had nullified the leal service owed to him by his lords through his own unjust actions.

Argella Durrandon had declared herself the storm queen as soon as the news of her father's death reached Storm's End. Had his defeat come as a surprise to her? Had she been convinced of her father's victory, of his invincibility? Or had she been prepared for his death all along? The history books were silent on these matters, and Argella herself disappeared from their accounts after her marriage to her father's slayer. History belonged to the victors, not to the vanquished and the defeated.

"Robert is not dead," Stannis insisted.

"Pray gods that he is not, my lord. But we must be prepared for any eventuality."

"He is not dead. I would know if he is." When you have lived under someone's shadow your whole life, surely you would know, if he was gone? Surely you could _feel_ it, in your bones, if he was no more?

"Shall we pray together? For your brother's victory and safe return."

Stannis scoffed. Cressen should have known better by now. "I would trust Robert's warhammer before I would trust the Seven."

He did not pray, but he spoke to Robert in the silence of his own thoughts, as he often did.

 _All your luck and all your charms, the sun always shining on you, always, your whole life; you cannot be dead._

 _You will not die. You must not._

 **AO3 Mirror**


	4. Chapter 4

**Stannis + Family (Parents)**

Rickard Stark spoke of his two boys with pride. "Only a year apart, and both still suckling their wet nurse's teats. Brandon -"

Tywin beckoned to Steffon. "A raven, from Storm's End."

Steffon paled. "Cassana?"

Tywin nodded. "Your lady wife has been brought to her childbed early."

Steffon had not wanted to come to King's Landing so close to Cassana's confinement, but Aerys had insisted. "It is not often the Lord of Winterfell graces King's Landing with his presence. I wish to show him the grandeur of my court, with all the southron lords in attendance. How would it look, for my own cousin to be absent?"

The king was nowhere in sight. "I must leave. _Now_."

Tywin's hand was on his arm, and for a moment it almost seemed like they were boys again, trading wordless reassurance with simple gestures. "Of course. Go. I will make your reason known to the king."

"May the gods bless you with another son, Lord Steffon." This, from Lord Rickard.

It mattered not a whit to Steffon if the child was a boy or a girl. As long as –

 _Women die in childbirth all the time. With or without their babes. Just because she has survived one birth, it does not mean -_

Enough! He would pray for the Mother's mercy, and he would not think of the worst.

(She was lighting candles for the Stranger, the second time he met her. "We do not pray to the Stranger," he had announced, with all the smugness of callow young men who thought they knew everything.

"I do."

"What do you pray for, when you pray to the Stranger?"

"I pray for him to keep away, to stay away as far as possible from the people I love.")

He prayed for the Stranger to keep away, from his wife and their child, all the way back to Storm's End, all the way home to her.

Maester Cressen hurried to the gate to greet him. "Lady Cassana is safe."

He could breathe again. "And the child?" he asked, after a beat.

"Another boy, my lord. He's …" Maester Cressen hesitated.

"What is it? Is he dead?"

"No, my lord. But he is small."

"Will he live?"

"If the gods will it."

She was feeding their son, breasts bared.

"He will not take milk from the wet nurse," Maester Cressen explained, keeping his gaze firmly on the floor. "I will be next door, my lady, if you have need of me."

"Thank you, Maester. For everything," Cassana replied.

Maester Cressen nodded and hurried to the door. Cassana turned to her husband, after the door was closed. "Maester Cressen has probably seen more of me than my own lord husband, pulling two children out of my womb, yet he trembles at the mere sight of my breasts."

Steffon approached the bed. "Do not tease him. He has taken the vows." He sat on the bed, slowly and carefully, afraid that the motion might disturb his son. There was not a peep from the babe, however.

He reached out to her. Kissed her brow and whispered, "You are here. You are safe. You have not left me."

"Here I am," she said. She held out the babe to her husband. "Your son, my lord."

His eyes were closed, the babe. Robert had bawled and shrieked, loud and lusty, the first time Steffon held him. This one, this one did not seem to notice yet he was being held by a different pair of hands than his mother's.

 _He will live, if the gods will it_ , Maester Cressen had said.

The eyes opened, deep blue, a blue as dark as the sea by night, staring at his father. Steffon forgot to breathe, for a moment.

"He will live," Cassana said, fiercely. " _I_ will it."


	5. Chapter 5

**Canon divergence AU in which the conversation between Stannis and Maester Aemon in ASOS touches on their shared relations.**

" _I am well aware of that," [Stannis] said. "I am aware of more than you know, Aemon Targaryen." (A Storm of Swords)_

" _Stannis... Stannis has some of the dragon blood in him, yes. His brothers did as well. Rhaelle, Egg's little girl, she was how they came by it... their father's mother... she used to call me Uncle Maester when she was a little girl." (A Feast for Crows)_

King Aegon the Fifth had visited the Wall many years ago. He brought a page with him, his black-haired Baratheon grandson. Rhaelle's boy. It was hard for Maester Aemon to think of little Rhaelle as a mother, the girl he used to bounce on his knees, the girl who used to call him Uncle Maester and begged to be allowed to play with his maester's chains.

"My mother sends her love to her favorite uncle." Those had been the first words out of Steffon Baratheon's mouth, upon meeting his great-uncle for the first time. Words from a mouth shaped for smiling, for laughing. His eyes laughed too, drinking in all the new sights with wonder and amazement.

This man, this king, Steffon's son; his voice was harsh, a bark. Maester Aemon did not need the power of sight to know that Stannis Baratheon was not smiling, let alone laughing.

 _Does he have his father's look?_ Foolish to wonder. _An old man's foolish fancy_ , Aemon scolded himself. Even if he was not blind, he would not be able to tell. He had never known what Steffon Baratheon looked like as a man, after all. Only as a boy.

"Your lord father was here, when he was a boy," he said, to Steffon's son.

"I know. He was ten. He dreamed of joining the Sworn Brothers of the Night's Watch and protecting the realm from the wicked enemies beyond the Wall. The dream lasted a whole day, until his grandsire reminded him that as the only son and heir of Lord Baratheon, he had more paramount duties to consider."

"I was grieved to hear of his passing." How many years ago was that? Aemon frowned to remember. Twenty? More than that? The years passed and blurred, the world turned and turned, and the death, oh the death. So _much_ death. And yet here he still was. Why did the gods spare him when they did not spare so many?

"Why should you grieve for my father? You know him scarcely at all."

"He was beloved by my brother. My brother -"

"I know who your brother was," Stannis said, in a tone that denoted finality and brooked no argument, in a tone that reminded Aemon of his own father when he would declare a subject closed and done with. Maekar Targaryen did not suffer fools or endless chatter gladly.

Steffon's son spoke again. "You could have been king, they said. You were the older of King Maekar's surviving sons."

"I was a maester of the Citadel, sworn to serve. And my brother would have made a better king, I believed. And I was proven right."

"Were you? Or is that a tale you tell yourself to sleep at night, after shirking your duty to the realm?"

Aemon despaired. _Egg, this is your great-grandson. Steffon's boy. Did he not know all that you tried to achieve? Did Summerhall … Aerys … the rebellion … did they erase all the good you tried so hard to do, for the realm, for the people?_

He raised his frail voice, shaking with the effort. "My brother … your great-grandsire was a good king. Or does it not suit the Baratheons to remember that?"

"He was better than most," Stannis replied, grudgingly, it seemed. "Not that the bar is raised very high, when it comes to good kings," he scoffed.

Perhaps this counted as high praise coming from this man, this king who reminded Aemon of another king, long ago.

Aemon thought of the cold sword, the sword without a heat Stannis had wielded.

 _He is not Azor Ahai come again. I must look elsewhere for that. But you would recognize him, Father, were you to meet him now._


End file.
